


if you're sorry, come to me

by citrusflower



Category: QCYN2, youth with you 2, 偶像练习生 | Idol Producer (TV), 青春有你2, 青春有你2 | Youth With You 2 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Actresses, Exes, F/F, Profanity, Trapped In Elevator, been thinking about this for a while and just had to do it, light spice, mention of smoking cigarettes, yani - Freeform, yuni - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:55:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24605782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/citrusflower/pseuds/citrusflower
Summary: Keni’s still looking at her, expression like steel in her nest of taffeta, firm yet gentle. “You know,” she says, and her tone is softer again. “If you feel hurt, you can just say that.”
Relationships: Yu Yan/Zeng Keni, 刚好喻见妮
Comments: 15
Kudos: 72





	if you're sorry, come to me

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [i won't sleep](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7921777) by [fated_addiction](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fated_addiction/pseuds/fated_addiction). 



> spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4QHnVfPRrnHpzDPjXcxkDl
> 
> had to write something for my favorite geminis. given their energy, it ended up being “trapped in elevator with your ex”. watch these two muddle out their feelings while stuck in a box together.
> 
> rated teen and up for mentions of smoking cigarettes (be careful, kids), some profanity, and some lightly spicy energy. loosely inspired by the fated_addiction fic linked above, mostly in trope.
> 
> zeng keni sweaterboy and yu yan absolute nightmare, enjoy <3

_If you're sorry, come to me_

_My heart is still heading toward you_

— minx, “like you”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“Big night,” Dai Meng remarks as Yu Yan slides into shotgun and pulls the door shut.

Dai Meng has a habit of intensely, almost obsessively, researching each gig. Yu Yan fakes annoyance but loves it.

“Yeah?”

Dai Meng nods. “Buncha actresses. _Women in film._ ” She hooks her fingers in air quotes.

“Hmm,” Yu Yan arranges herself in her seat, flipping the mirror down for a quick hair check. “I really don’t care.”

Dai Meng shoots her a look of mock offense. “Have some _respect_. I'll be dancing with my future wife at the afterparty.”

Yu Yan rolls her eyes and pushes the mirror back up. “Drive, asshole.”

“Respect!” Dai Meng says, but her grin is wide as she revs the engine. Yu Yan sticks her arm into the wind as they turn onto the main road.

  
  
  
  
  


Yu Yan might not have envisioned this life for herself, but honestly, it's not bad. She hosts on radio every so often, and then she has this. Catering is both mind-numbing and mind-consuming; she vacillates wildly between spacing out and fixating on each perfect detail: plating, packing, unloading. Making sure everything stays put.

“Stepping out,” she calls after she's finished arranging the last of the tiny sandwiches on their tiered tray. Her voice echoes into the cavernous ballroom. She realizes Dai Meng is already upstairs prepping for the VIP reception and takes out her phone to text instead.

 _Don't take too long_ , comes the reply. _I need you on the top floor in twenty._

 _Sure, boss_ , she types as she walks to one of the ballroom’s double doors, leaning into it to push it open. _Maybe I'll steal the van._

She slips out into the back lot where it’s parked with all the trash bins and squints up at what's left of the day. It's barely the end of winter: the air is cool, but a little bit of sun peeks over the giant hedges that fringe the convention center.

She loosens her tie with one hand and reaches into her shirt pocket with the other; two minutes later, she's exhaling the slow, steady burn of smoke, cigarette between her fingers. Breathe in, breathe out. She toes the curb with her black dress shoe. Three hours of social interaction left, standing behind the white tablecloth and pouring wine for whoever it is today, and then she can go home and take out her guitar, maybe work on another song or cover. Maybe she’ll look at some of the instrumentals Chengxuan sent her over email: _For you! (^○^)_ She smokes til there's five minutes left, straightens her tie again, and heads back in.

She’s relieved when she’s the only one in the elevator. She presses _55_ , opening her texts, and is dismayed when the elevator dings almost immediately. She looks up from her phone as the doors open.

She sees the shoes first, metallic bronze pointy-toed things, ankles ringed with diamonds. The long crimson folds of the dress, fanned out at the calf and cinching in gold at the waist, to wrap and flower out around one shoulder and leave the other bare. This person has a decidedly feline energy, the sleek litheness of a big cat, she thinks, before she realizes she’s only known one person like this, and of course the universe would do this to her. Her eyes drag up the final centimeters as if through molasses, half-unwilling, half-wanting, just in time.

“Yu Yan,” Keni says.

  
  
  
  
  


She steps into the elevator, and Yu Yan can’t not look at her. It takes her back all those years to when she first saw that willowy girl walk into the trainee room, somehow simultaneously confident and modest, and felt the itchy beginnings of irritation: _I don’t like her._ The pearl kept growing, though, unbidden.

“Yu Yan,” Keni says again, with a little more press in it, and Yu Yan snaps back into focus.

“Don’t you have a bodyguard or something,” she snaps, almost, and her tone is colder than she intended.

But Keni just tilts her head and smiles — not a shiny paparazzi beam but one of her delicate, close-lipped ones that draws the edges of her mouth up, gently, and holds them there. It hurts Yu Yan even more.

“No,” Keni says simply. “Enough security in the building.” She walks to the back of the elevator and stands on the left.

“I’m — sorry,” Yu Yan says, rushing now, surprising herself. “I didn’t mean to be rude.”

“That’s okay,” Keni says. She is beautiful, forgiving, like old times, and Yu Yan doesn’t know why this is happening to her, this weird rom-com elevator meet-cute; it feels like something that would happen to, oh, she doesn’t know, Chengxuan or something.

Keni leans over to peer at the control panel, and then at her. “You’re going up?”

Yu Yan folds her hands together awkwardly. “Yeah.”

Keni straightens again and seems to take in her clothes for the first time: starched white double-breasted shirt with that darned ascot tie; simple black pants; dress shoes. Yu Yan isn’t ashamed of her job, but she feels the difference.

She can tell Keni is about to say something, so she opens her mouth again and barrels on. “Look, let’s not make it awkward, okay? Let’s just… go.”

Keni presses her lips together so they almost disappear. She nods. “Okay.”

The elevator door closes. Yu Yan shoots a glance at the numbers. Fifty-three floors to go.

  
  
  
  
  


The elevator jolts right before floor thirty-eight.

 _Damn_ , Yu Yan thinks. _Of all things._

Keni is already holding onto her arm. Yu Yan had felt her reach out when the elevator first began to shudder; there had been a slow rush of satisfaction, the requisite guilt chasing it. Now, she tries to turn as naturally as possible.

Keni is looking back up at her, both hands holding Yu Yan’s arm. “Sorry,” she says, but she doesn’t look sorry at all. Just — neutral. “Heels.”

“Toughen up,” Yu Yan says, on reflex, and regrets it immediately.

Something hardens almost imperceptibly in Keni’s eyes, but she only stands back up and looks toward the control panel. “Which button is it again?”

Yu Yan tries not to feel too rejected. “Probably the one with the alarm bell. Or actually, the one with the phone icon.”

She watches Keni talk to the dispatcher with an elegance she doesn’t remember. Her movements are more — collected now, in professional mode, even hunched on the floor of an elevator, the sharp slope of her cheekbones still proud. Yu Yan wonders how else she’s changed, how else she’s stayed the same.

“Well, that’s that,” Keni says, and Yu Yan draws herself back into her body, the present. Keni is looking at her in an about-to-be-exhausted kind of way, one slender hand on hip. “At least an hour, huh.”

Yu Yan’s phone lights up: _Everything okay?_

She swallows.

  
  
  
  
  


It takes all of two seconds for Keni to take off her heels. Or rather, to ask Yu Yan if it’d be okay if she did.

Yu Yan makes a _tch_ sound from where she’s replying to Dai Meng’s _Shit, I’m so sorry._ “Yeah, why not?”

Keni raises a brow. “Okay.”

And it’s not that Yu Yan has anything against it. She remembers wearing heels all the time back then, ridiculous platform pumps and shiny stilettos that curled her toes into unbearable positions when she danced, left angry red marks on her ankles. It’s just that — Keni sitting cross-legged like that, nestled in the red layers of her dress, _barefoot_ — it feels too intimate. Like Yu Yan hasn’t earned this level of closeness. Not when Keni looks over at her now, her face still carefully set, but with something behind her eyes that looks like it could say — _Maybe?_

Yu Yan holds the eye contact until it feels like the elevator walls fade away. She doesn’t know why she’s entertaining this. Whatever it is.

“We match,” Keni says finally, looking almost hopeful. She gestures to her red monstrosity, then Yu Yan’s tie, and Yu Yan feels irritation begin to prickle again.

“Look,” she says, “I don’t know if you’re trying to be _nice_ — ”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Keni’s eyes are sharp. When she speaks, there’s an edge to it. “Some of us actually _care_ about other people’s feelings.”

“I — ” Yu Yan almost sputters. She can feel herself raising her chin defensively. Goddammit. She thought she’d trained that out of herself. “I just don’t see the point.”

Keni’s still looking at her, expression like steel in her nest of taffeta, firm yet gentle. “You know,” she says, and her tone is softer again. “If you feel hurt, you can just say that.”

“I don’t see the _point_ ,” Yu Yan says again, and it feels like she’s scrabbling for a foothold now, panic beginning to blossom in her throat. Trapped. “It’s been almost two years.”

“So?” Keni says. She narrows her eyes. “You never did get a therapist, did you.”

Yu Yan winces internally. “I tried. It just didn’t work for me.” It hadn’t. She’d gone to a few first consultations, tried a few different styles. There was one she thought might work, but then it hadn’t, and she’d just — let it go. And beyond all that, above it all, the thought of — just _telling_ someone _everything_ — felt like an insurmountable thing. She always felt stuck between not wanting pity and not wanting people to _know_. Her memory, her pearl, her precious thing.

Keni lets the silence hang in the air for a noticeable moment. “Alright,” she says finally.

Yu Yan is beginning to feel uncomfortable again. “How long did they say it’d take?”

The edge of Keni’s mouth curls. “It’s been five minutes. Barely.”

Yu Yan suppresses an eyeroll. “But how _long_.”

“Hmmmmm,” Keni says, almost theatrically. “Could be forever.”

  
  
  
  
  


(Yu Yan remembers the day Keni got her first callback.

“I think this really might be something,” she’d said, all soft and wistful as they were lying on the couch, Yu Yan feeling small and nestled into her neck.

“It’s just a callback,” Yu Yan had reminded her, because she knew Keni’s infinite capacity for hope. “Be careful.”

But the callback had turned into a second audition, then a third, and then a phone call at 7am on a Saturday: “Yu Yan, you won’t believe — ”

But of course Yu Yan could. Talented, charming, Zeng Keni. She could do anything.

And she took off, signing more contracts, staying over less, materializing on screens and billboards and advertisements that seemed to taunt Yu Yan whenever she looked out a window into the city.

 _I don’t want to lose you._ How it was easier to say anything than that.)

  
  
  
  
  


“I listen to your show sometimes,” Keni says somewhere past the first hour. She’s slouched a little from the wall now, fiddling with her dress. They’ve begun to make small talk: TV, the weather, friends from the old days.

“Only sometimes?” Yu Yan says dryly, mouth curving into something bitter as she looks up from where she’s drawn her knees up to her chest. She can’t process that sentence right now.

“I can’t listen every week.” Keni says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “Filming.”

Yu Yan draws in a breath and says, very carefully, “What are you doing?”

“Talking to you.”

“No, like…” Yu Yan sighs. “Why are you saying you listen to my show.”

Keni pauses. “It’s just… It’s nice, you know? I remember you writing the songs.”

God, the _songs_. Yu Yan remembers days spent curled up by the window, writing, writing, writing until Keni would come back and ask to listen and Yu Yan would pull out her guitar, sit on that old worn sofa with her, take a deep breath, and _play_.

Yu Yan scoffs lightly. “I can’t tell if that means you’ve moved on or you’re still…” She can’t bring herself to finish the sentence. She hasn’t followed any of Keni’s projects for this exact reason.

“I think this is beyond that, honestly.”

Something strikes Yu Yan’s chest, sudden and cold. “What does _that_ mean?”

“It’s just what I feel,” Keni murmurs, and pauses. “I never hated you,” she says, and the words hit Yu Yan like the snap of a rubber band, the ghost of the opposite sentence just out of reach. “The feeling is just outside of… whether we’re happening.”

 _Damn Zeng Keni_ , Yu Yan thinks. _Always just saying what you feel._

“And what’s wrong with that?” Keni asks evenly, and Yu Yan realizes that she’s said it aloud. Keni’s gaze is burning now, a slow, steady fire to it. “Better than not saying _anything_ , even after people give their all to you, for _years_.”

Yu Yan feels it like a punch to the gut.

“Okay,” she says, finally. “I feel hurt.”

Keni huffs. She’s pouting in a way that would be unflattering on anyone else. “...Thank you.”

“I’m sorry,” Yu Yan says. “ _sā jiāo_ Zeng Keni,” she tries, testing the waters.

Keni crosses her arms imperiously, and Yu Yan knows she’s no longer dangling on the ledge. “ _Why_ are you sorry?”

“I’m sorry… You’re stuck in this elevator.”

“’sfine,” Keni grumbles. “Didn’t want to be there anyway.”

Yu Yan holds up her hand. “I’m not done yet.” She sighs and stretches her legs out. Her shoes near Keni’s side of the elevator. “I’m sorry…” — she exhales — “You’re stuck in this elevator… With me.”

“And why is that?” Keni says, arms still crossed, looking away, but Yu Yan can feel that she’s on her way to being placated. The familiarity hits her with a pang.

“I’m… an asshole who can’t communicate,” Yu Yan says, and winces for real.

Keni exhales a little almost-laugh and looks up at her. “You are.” She tilts her head a little and looks at Yu Yan, considering. “I accept your apology.”

  
  
  
  
  


(A memory:

“Play it, play it! I wanna hear it.” Keni throws her arms around her, toppling them both onto the couch. She’s just gotten back from dance and the light scent of sweat is mixed in with her perfume, clean and floral.

“Okay, okay,” Yu Yan says, laughing wide as Keni’s hair curtains them both. “You sure you don’t wanna shower?”

“You’re gonna need a shower too by the time I’m done with you,” Keni whispers lowly against her ear, tone playful.

Yu Yan feels the tingle down her spine and swats at her. “Shut _uuup_.”

“You love it.”

Yu Yan rolls her eyes. She can’t say no to that. She squirms out of Keni’s hold for her guitar and settles herself on the couch, Keni sitting just across from her. She looks into Keni’s eyes, clear and open, steadies herself, and begins.

_The wild cat that’s been tamed hides beneath the moonlight_

_With languid slow movements, preferring to wander amidst the flowers_

_To easily make the kill, don’t keep avoiding, avoiding, avoiding, avoiding_

_You’re my one and only choice_

_What I’m saying, listen to me, this is heaven-made_

_Lovers and kings alike been enticed by a fatal look in the eyes…_ )

  
  
  
  
  


(“It was bad, but before that, it was good,” Yu Yan said to Dai Meng one night when they were out at a bar. Keni’s face had just appeared on the wall TV in an ad for some charity. “We just didn’t want the same things,” — a vastly mild way to put it: Yu Yan wanting to do well, Keni wanting to do good.

_You love dance!_

_I’ll take what I can get._

“Ah,” Dai Meng said.)

  
  
  
  
  


“Another hour,” Yu Yan says, after they hang up together on the dispatcher’s most recent update, huddled by the control panel. “I almost don’t believe it.” She sits down again and watches Keni do the same a respectable distance apart.

“You’re still smoking,” Keni says, almost to herself, and before Yu Yan can say _What_ , she continues: “I can smell it on you.” Yu Yan doesn’t have to look up to feel Keni’s stare, but she does anyway. Keni’s eyes are curious, thoughtful.

It had been another of the things Keni hadn’t liked, Yu Yan thinks, even though she’d liked the smell of Yu Yan’s jacket when she’d just gotten back from a night shift, Yu Yan’s smoke and leather mingling with Keni’s orchid and silk. Even though she’d liked to lift her hands and run them through Yu Yan’s hair, loosen it from its inevitable ponytail so the smoke would come over her, around them, as she leaned in, pulled her down.

Yu Yan can’t go any further. “Yeah,” she says, glancing away. “I am.”

When she looks back, Keni’s eyes are on her still, her gaze like an anchor, a sword. And Yu Yan feels it.

_Don’t keep avoiding, avoiding, avoiding, avoiding._

_You’re my one and only choice._

“Come here,” Keni says, quietly, sitting like that, the princess in red.

Yu Yan shifts forward and tucks her legs under her to sit on her heels, and there is suddenly so much less distance between them. She leans forward. They’re directly across from each other now. The space between them feels like it’s buzzing and frozen all at once.

“Yu Yan,” Keni says, her voice like a flower unfolding, like all those years ago, the first time, and Yu Yan feels a part of herself begin to cave in.

When Yu Yan leans in to kiss her she feels like she’s falling, and she knows she shouldn’t, they shouldn’t, this is an _absolutely_ fucking stupid idea. But Keni’s hands find her jaw, pull her closer, hold her in place. She breathes.

  
  
  
  
  


After, when they are putting themselves together again, waiting for the dispatcher’s call, Keni is quiet.

Yu Yan watches her put a bobby pin in her mouth as she adjusts her ponytail, then take it out and slide it into place. Drinks in the grace of her hands, the curve of her shoulder, how the muscle becomes more defined when she lifts her arm. There are so many things she wants and doesn’t want to say, all at the same time.

Keni finishes and seems to exhale, curling into herself a little. They’re here again, sitting across from each other, just like the beginning.

“My number’s still the same,” she says, so softly that Yu Yan almost doesn’t catch it. When she looks up, Keni’s face is quietly defiant. “This isn’t asking you for anything.”

Yu Yan looks at her, tries to remember her. “Okay.”

  
  
  
  
  


When the dispatcher calls and Dai Meng texts _I’ll come pick you up_ and the elevator opens to a small group of worried-looking building staff, time seems to kick back into normal speed: _too fast._

Yu Yan watches Keni step up and out of the elevator, supported by two gloved hands, and feels a wave of dull panic. It’s only when she climbs out herself that she realizes that Keni is still there, talking to someone Yu Yan assumes is her manager, in the fringes of the crowd now swarming the elevator with big metal tools and important-looking papers.

Keni sees her and murmurs something to her manager before heading down the hallway. Yu Yan follows and watches Keni push open the door to the restroom.

She opens the door to Keni peering at her makeup by the sinks.

There’s a pause as Keni’s eyes meet hers through the mirror. “I needed to freshen up.”

Yu Yan stands, frozen, suddenly unsure of what she’s doing. She walks slowly to join Keni at the sinks. She doesn’t know where to look.

Next to her, Keni straightens. She closes her clutch; it feels final.

“Keni?” Yu Yan says, the familiar sense of urgency gripping her again.

Keni stills, and then turns to face her.

“I…” Yu Yan says. And what is she supposed to say, after all?

Keni looks at her, eyes honest still, the face that captured the nation. “Yu Yan,” she says, and there’s something sad in her smile.

Yu Yan can’t speak, even though she knows she has to, and it’s settling in now, isn’t it.

There’s a knock on the door. “Zeng Keni?”

Keni looks sharply in its direction. “Just a minute! You can wait for me in the hallway.”

When the footsteps fade away, Keni turns back. She reaches out and takes one of Yu Yan’s hands in both of her own. “I never hated you, okay?” Her gaze is kind; God, she’s too kind. And then she steps toward the door.

“Wait,” Yu Yan calls out, because it really does feel like time is running out now.

Keni pauses, hovers in the open doorway. Her hair has escaped its hold again; a few wisps float around her face. It disrupts the sharp lines of her face, makes her look younger.

Yu Yan knows she’s waiting, still, even now. If Yu Yan looks, really looks, she sees her like they were five, ten, fifteen years ago. When the world was wide and open. When time was all they had.

Yu Yan thinks of everything she could say. _It’s been lonely. — I was cruel to you, I know. — I really am sorry. — I wanted us to fight for each other; why didn’t you fight? — I’m afraid I’ll never find anyone like you again. — You absolute idiot._

_— I loved you the most._

She takes a deep breath. In. Out.

“I never hated you either,” she says, and leaves it at that.

A flicker of a smile flits across Keni’s face.

“ _zài jiàn_ ,” she says.

**Author's Note:**

> \- this is set in an au where they met and started dating while trying to make it in the idol industry, but neither of them could. keni took an offer to become an actress and yu yan stuck to her passion for singing and now hosts on radio and caters on the side.  
> \- the song quoted at the beginning is [“like you”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVSwc90DNZg) by minx, a group that debuted in 2014 and is now dreamcatcher. they are very talented! support them!  
> \- keni’s dress is a mix between [this elie saab f/w ’19-’20](https://media.vogue-fashion-shows.com/photos/5d1caa9f181a8d6efd903c99/2:3/w_1280%2cc_limit/_FIO0041.jpg) and [this marchesa f/w ’16-’17](https://www3.pictures.livingly.com/it/Marchesa+Fall+2016+Details+T6NOfJkRThYl.jpg)  
> \- the convention center is based off the [time warner center](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/54/77/58/5477581a5b54e86406de9210e134e50d.jpg) in nyc, which has 55 floors  
> \- re: the elevator stopping just before floor 38: on ep 1 of the show girls fighting (where keni and yu yan first met), keni was seat #38  
> \- the lyrics to the song yu yan performs for keni are from yu yan’s [“lion cat” (shī zi māo/ 狮子猫)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pD4TDJ3KiFo), which she sang during qcyn2. translation mine; i take responsibility for dubious accuracy. those lyrics are complicated.  
> \- sā jiāo (撒娇), the word yu yan uses when she says “sā jiāo zeng keni”, means “annoying” or “childish”  
> \- zài jiàn (再见), the words keni says at the end, is the common phrase for “goodbye”, but it can also literally translate to “[let’s] meet again” (再 = “again”, 见 = “meet”). keni is being ambiguous.
> 
> thank you for putting up with this terribly lengthy note!  
> find me on twitter [@queqiaos](https://twitter.com/queqiaos)  
> tweet version of fic lives [here](https://twitter.com/queqiaos/status/1270163421925908480?s=20). interact as you wish!
> 
> -
> 
> This story is part of the LLF Comment Project, which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites and appreciates feedback, including:
> 
>   * Short comments
>   * Long comments
>   * Questions
>   * Constructive criticism
>   * “<3” as extra kudos
>   * Reader-reader interaction
> 

> 
> This author responds to comments! If you don’t want a reply for any reason, feel free to sign your comment with “whisper” and I will appreciate it but not respond!


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